The Phone Call
by Roadrunnerz
Summary: It's a dark and stormy night and something is lurking outside of David's cabin...


**_The Phone Call_**

_Crash!_

Anna nearly jumped outof her skin when the deafening noise shot through the cabin. A window burst open at the same time, sending in a wave of cold, wet air.

Anna ran to close it and a gust of rain poured over her head.

"Great," she mumbled, shaking her wet hair out over her bare shoulders. She wore the same black dress she had worn weeks ago when her and David's dinner plans were cancelled due to his sudden urge to stay home with Leora.

Things had changed since then. Leora's health had steadily improved and David began to relax. He slowly started to believe in the notion of their little girl living long enough to visit them in a nursing home. It was no longer a hope and a wish, but a real genuine possibility.

After all they had been through, Leora was going to be alright.

_Leora._ The thought of her made Anna run into the baby's room to see if the noise had woken her.

Anna smiled when she saw the baby fast asleep, her lips pursed, as if in deep thought.

'The parenting books were right when they said a baby will sleep through World War Three once it's asleep.'

Anna left the room just as another ear-splitting noise echoed through the cabin, making her grimace.

She stepped outside, onto the cabin's deck to check out the source of the noise, not surprised at what she saw. In the distance, Anna could see at least ten spindly threads of crooked, white rods spanning across the horizon. Illuminating it.

_Lighting._

Searing knifes of electricity cascaded down from the heavens and hit the earth below with such a violent fury it took her breath away.

And when they were done, like an orchestra nearing its finale, they marked their descent with an earth shattering crescendo that threatened to engulf the world around it with its roar.

_Thunder._

Anna cringed as she felt more raindrops hitting her face. Normally she could see the lights of Pine Valley from the deck of the cabin, now all she could see was darkness and rain. Earlier in the day, the rain fell in soft, gentle drops but now it pummelled to the ground in huge splashes that wanted to match the ferocity of the thunder and lighting.

'So much for our dinner date tonight,' she thought with a rueful frown. David should have been home by now, but there was no doubt that the slow moving traffic in this weather was causing his delay. In fact, he left her a message earlier letting her know he might be late because of the impending storm.

She considered changing back into something more comfortable, now that going out for dinner was no longer an option but then decided against it. David loved the black dress she wore, loved how it hugged her slender frame as though it was tailor made for her. She smiled as she thought of the look of surprise in his eyes when he would walk through the door.

Then she winced as another deafening noise filled the cabin. This time it was loud enough to make the wooden structure shake.

'Maybe the lightning hit a nearby tree,' she thought, looking out the window into the darkness of the surrounding forest.

There was no curtain on the window. It wasn't necessary. Their nearest neighbour lived miles away.

Anna felt her heart skip a beat when she thought she saw a dark figure moving amidst the trees.

'It's your imagination,' she chided herself, still staring into the forest, nonetheless. It was completely dark. Black, wet leaves and branches whipped back and forth in the fury of the storm.

She gasped when she thought she saw it again. Anna wasn't sure what it was but it was as dark as the trees that surrounded the cabin. Except it moved.

'It's probably a deer,' she thought, taking a deep breath, wishing for the first time that there _was_ a curtain to draw.

Normally the forest comforted her, but now during the storm, in its absolute darkness, it no longer offered any sort of familiarity. It was wild and it was frightening.

"Good thing you don't scare easily..." she reminded herself aloud.

Another noise rang through the cabin, and, as if mocking her arrogant announcement, she jumped up in terror.

This time it was the sound of the phone ringing.

"Geez...get a grip," she whispered to herself, picking it up on the second ring.

She sat down on the rocking chair, next to the phone.

"Hello?"

The only sound she heard on the other end was static. Then she remembered David saying something about his cell phone not working properly.

"David?"

"_I'm sorry to have kept you waiting_."

A relieved smile spread across her face. "It's alright. The weather's awful out there."

_"I feel like I can see you."_ There was so much static on the phone it was hard to make out his voice.

Anna grinned, "Is that right? So what am I wearing?"

"_You're wearing that dress. That gorgeous black dress with the spaghetti straps_."

Anna chuckled, "Nice guess."

_"Its smooth fabric is caressing your body, the same way your wet hair is caressing the wood of the rocking chair."_

The smile suddenly left her face. _How could he…?_

"David?"

_"I won't keep you waiting much longer, my love." _

Anna held the receiver with trembling hands.

"David?"

Nothing. There was no response. Only static.

_"David?" _

Anna turned off the phone and as soon as she did, all the lights went out, plunging the cabin into darkness.

"Damn it," she cursed under her breath, hating that the phone call left her more unsettled than the darkness she was now in.

'It was David,' she reminded herself, before getting up to search for the flashlight on the mantle of the fireplace. 'Of course it was…'

Unable to see even her hand on front of her face, she stumbled in the wall of blackness that covered her, hitting her leg against a table.

She cried out in pain, noting only then that her breath came in quick, nervous gasps.

Her hand ran along the mantle of the fireplace, searching clumsily until she grasped the flashlight.

She turned it on and breathed a sigh of relief to see a beam of light cutting through the utter darkness.

'Leora…' was her first thought. A sudden instinctive need to see if her daughter was alright.

It was then that the door of the cabin burst wide open, interrupting her thoughts.

'Oh god...my gun,' she thought in that one nerve wracking second, wishing it was her gun she was holding rather than the flashlight.

She pointed the flashlight towards door, where a dark silhouette stood in the doorframe.

Her heart pounded.

"Anna?"

Anna moved a hand to her racing heart. "David..." She had never uttered his name with quite so much relief in her voice.

"Hey baby," he moved to kiss her. "I saw the lights go out as I was parking the car."

Anna gave him a kiss on the cheek, noticing it was wet from the rain. "It's the storm…it must have knocked out the power."

"I can have a look at the box…"

"No," Anna shook her head, not wanting him to leave. "You're soaked. It's okay, we can get the other flashlight and light some candles."

David smiled in the semi-darkness, "Candles…and you in that dress. That may just beat dinner at a fancy restaurant."

Anna relaxed and returned his smile. "But you knew about the dress."

"I knew about the dress?" he gave her a puzzled look.

"When you called…"

"I don't think I mentioned the dress in the message I left earlier, did I?"

Anna narrowed her brows, "Not the message you left. The phone call."

"I brought the cell phone in, to have it fixed after I left work today."

"But just now, a couple of minutes ago…you called."

David's expression was puzzled again, "I couldn't have called from the car. I had no phone."

Anna froze, unable to move.

_"…the same way your wet hair is caressing the wood of the rocking chair."_

"Anna, what is it?"

_Leora._

Anna raced to the baby's bedroom, flashlight in hand.

She bent over the crib, making sure she could feel the steady rise and fall of Leora's breath. Anna held the flashlight up to the baby's tiny perfect face, relieved to see her daughter was perfectly fine. Asleep.

Only when she saw something else on the baby's pillow, did Anna recoil in terror.

She wanted to scream. Instead, she covered her mouth with her hands, to muffle the sound.

Mere inches from Leora's sleeping head was a flower. An orchid.

"Anna?" David had followed her into the bedroom. "What's wrong?"

Anna scooped the flower up into the palm of her hand and crushed it. Before he could see it.

"Nothing."

"You're shivering."

"It's cold."

David grabbed a blanket from a drawer and draped it over her shoulders. "Are you sure that's all it is?"

Anna stared into his eyes, not oblivious to the concern in them. "Yeah…that's all."

He wrapped his arms around her, tightly, gently, letting her feel the love in them.

She sank into his embrace, while staring out the window of Leora's room.

Then she saw it again. A figure in the darkness.

Moving.

**_The End_**


End file.
